Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Taking a step back and reflecting

Well, I'm not one of the most active posters on the Poker Lizard Blog, but I've been doing a lot of reflecting on this beautiful game of poker. In the bar leagues that I play at, I'm considered one of the most respected and dangerous poker players out there. In fact, I overheard someone tell me that if they had to pick a top 10, I would be in the last. Very humbling to hear since I haven't played seriously in such a long time.

The reason why I'm writing this post is in response to what Mr. Devonshire wrote in his blog. He wrote something that hit me at home. He said the following

"The other thing that I've been thinking a lot about these last two weeks is how sick this game is. Y'all know about my gnarly run from July to December last year, losing 100k and breaking myself. After the soul searching and everything I did, I had decided in January that if nothing good happened by the 25k next week I was quitting poker. Why? I wasn't having fun anymore
...."

That's the way I felt for such a long time about poker. Granted, I'm not a true grinder, a consummate pro. In fact, I'm still longing for the days where I get my butt back into the casino and start dominating the games again. However, I wasn't having fun either. It felt more like work, and when you have such a mentality, then you don't want to do it anymore. I think the beautiful thing about poker is that it brings people together (Sidenote: That's how I met my girlfriend is through poker), but it was the same stuff over and over again. It wasn't that I was playing poorly and not up to par, but sometimes, when I played my games and saw someone do a "donkey" move and get paid off on it, I would be like, "Why do I work so f***'ing hard and not get results." The mentality was getting me in trouble.

Here's the thing that I wanted to say is the most important. If you need a break from something you love, then take it. A poker game will always be there whether it be at a casino, poker room, or home game. What I really needed was a break from it all, and from that, I started developing other games that I'm becoming more adept at. It took a break from poker for me to realize why I love the game so much, and if you are hitting that wall like I did, it might be something you need as well. Don't get me wrong, I didn't completely take a break from poker cold turkey. I always wrote in my poker journals, set up situations for myself to see what I would do, but I dramatically cut my playing time to get my mentality back. If you need a break, take it.